Mattu Barr describes herself as an old-school public servant. As group director at School Infrastructure NSW, she wanted to follow the correct procurement procedures and would speak up for junior staff. Her responsibilities included ensuring all information released to the media was accurate.
When a car crashed through Banksia Road Public School in 2017, killing two children, she clashed with her boss, Anthony Manning, about how to answer inquiries asking if asbestos was present.
Former School Infrastructure NSW chief executive Anthony Manning during a parliamentary inquiry in 2022.Credit: Dominic Lorrimer
“I actually wrote the response, and I said … ‘In the time frame that we have, we can only say that there is a possibility that there’s asbestos’,” she told a corruption inquiry on Thursday.
She took it to Manning, the then-head of School Infrastructure NSW.
“And he asked me to change it, to say that there was no asbestos in the classroom,” Barr said.
The Independent Commission Against Corruption is probing numerous examples of how long-time friends of Manning were employed as contractors with big salaries while those who raised concerns about how public money was being spent allegedly faced reprisal action.
The crash at Banksia Road Public School in 2017.Credit: Nick Moir
The clash about asbestos was one of a suite of negative interactions Barr had with Manning after he took on the top job in 2017 at School Infrastructure NSW, which is responsible for building and maintaining public schools.
“It didn’t matter what I went into his office to talk to him about. I always left feeling humiliated and belittled and incompetent,” she told the inquiry.
Barr expressed concerns that changes within the infrastructure unit meant there was diminished oversight of procurement, which includes finding suppliers and managing contracts for new schools, to a single person. She articulated her concerns in an email to Manning in November 2017.
Mattu Barr was called into a meeting about a business plan but was blindsided by a termination notice.
In response, Manning said: “I disagre [sic] with your assertion that the altemative [sic] does not reflect robust govemance [sic] process, or little oversight and review, the same team are providing the core advice, but in a more responsive manner, and I still retain overall approval responsibility.”
She was also concerned with the recruitment of a consultant, Lily Wong, who she thought was on a contract valued at more than $50,000 – an arrangement which not been approved by the chief financial officer [CFO], as required by NSW Treasury.
“Mr Manning said to me that he didn’t need to obtain CFO approval. He was the chief executive officer. And I said to him, ‘Well, actually, under the Treasury guidelines, you do.’ ”
In another meeting with the executive of School Infrastructure NSW during a busy period, she made a routine point to remind senior leaders to be patient with junior staff tasked with writing responses to parents and schools about infrastructure upgrades.
“And he then said to me, if they’re that busy, why don’t I bring someone else in to do your job and you write correspondence.”
She attempted to escalate her concerns about compliance not being met in a meeting with Sorcha O’Neill – the director in the office of the then-Department of Education secretary Mark Scott. She relayed criticism of Manning from a low-level employee whom Manning had sought to sack after he discovered he had made a mistake.
Barr said in that meeting, O’Neill immediately tried to shut down any criticism of Manning, saying “he’s a friend of mine” and “please don’t say anything else about him”.
“So then I tried to raise with her that I had concerns about Mr Manning’s conduct in terms of compliance”, but based on the reception she had received, she realised that “Mr Manning had perhaps already spoken to her about me, and there was no purpose to raising anything.”
In December 2017, she was called into a meeting to discuss a business plan and she was handed a letter which detailed that she was being fired.
“I sent an email after [to] everybody saying, ‘Guess what? I’ve just been terminated.’ ”
Former School Infrastructure employee Kathleen Donohoe also detailed at the hearing on Thursday how she had expressed concerns regarding procurement, including around classroom furniture.
“I had asked a lot of questions about why people were in roles when they didn’t come to meetings, or they were doing their PhD while they were working,” she said.
She made a formal public interest disclosure. Then she was also called into a meeting room and was told she would be made redundant, she told the hearing. However, she was subsequently advised that she would be moved to another unit in the Department of Education. She was ultimately made redundant from that role in January 2024.
Under questioning from Manning’s barrister, Tim Hale, SC, Donohoe said she did not know if the person doing the PhD had permission from the Department of Education to do it.
The hearing continues.
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